


Serendipity

by AwkwardNinja



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Canon Compliant, Harry gets drunk guys, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Trigger Warnings for mental health problems and some over consumption of alcohol, post-canon AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-04
Updated: 2019-12-04
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:55:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21666268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AwkwardNinja/pseuds/AwkwardNinja
Summary: The war is over, has been for a few years now. But Harry still feels like something is wrong. Without a grand purpose or some horrible life event to trudge through, he’s a little untethered, still raw from his past, and is just trying to figure things out. A night of drunken revelry taken just a little bit too far leads him somewhere new, and yet familiar all at the same time.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, eventual Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter - Relationship
Comments: 1
Kudos: 7
Collections: Harry Potter Fic





	1. Chapter 1

The monthly Hogwarts pub night finds Harry listing gently on a bar stool to the din and clamour of the Leaky Cauldron. He’s pretty sure he started this night with other people, but he finds that he doesn’t really mind this development so much. He doesn’t remember when coming here, to the twinkling dim lights and the raucous laughter and the sloshing of mugs and the hearty comradery, stopped feeling warm and welcoming, when it stopped being a relief, a chance for him to relax outside of eat and work and sleep and repeat.

He wonders if it ever really was in the first place.

So it doesn’t come as a surprise that when his friends do eventually find him, and Ron claps him loudly on the back with an “A’right, Harry?” and Hermione, even bright eyed and flushed, shoots him a look and a smile with a little too much understanding, he feels a drunken flare of irritation instead of gratitude. And then immediately wishes he was too drunk to comprehend that feeling, because these are his friends, who are always there for him and who came and found him when he was pathetic and alone at a bar in a room full of revelers. Right.

And so he finds himself not five minutes later, crammed into a booth with Ron and Hermione and Seamus and Dean, and Ginny, too, who he shoots a small, hesitant smile as he sits down. He finds that it doesn’t hurt so much when she hesitantly smiles back, and in fact brings a shard of warmth to the place near where he thinks his heart used to be, despite how things ended between them. He thinks, now, with time and distance that they are both really better off, and that he’s missed her friendship all this time, because she is bright and fierce and loyal and above all else, kind. 

So Harry stays there, between the steadily growing less solid presence of his friends, exchanging stories and knocking back Firewhisky to burn away the cold that sometimes sneaks up on him and coats his insides, when he’s not paying attention. 

He sometimes wonders what exactly is wrong with him, these days, and he’s heard enough about PTSD and post war depression and recovering from trauma to know he should probably do something about it, but for now Seamus is telling a story about how he ran into Lee Jordan in the floo at Gringotts the other day, literally, and how the soot exploded so spectacularly that they were actually chased out, official business be damned, and Harry finds himself laughing with genuine mirth for the first time in what might’ve been ages, his friends hooting and snorting into their glasses beside him. And he thinks this night might not’ve turned out to be so bad, even if he wishes this place weren’t so loud and public and that he didn’t feel so unsteady and hot because of all the alcohol. 

Eventually, he stumbles his way out of his seat, not entirely sure how he ended up like this in the first place but too pissed to be too bothered by it, to the slurred laughter of his friends. No one else is paying him any attention, anyway, he absently thinks, as the whole place is still in full swing, though a couple people do shove past him hard enough to make him stumble again, his brain sluggish. 

He notices his friends laughing again, and he sways as he turns to them, feeling the corners of his lips pulling down and his brow slightly furrowing as he says, “As if  _ you _ lot are any better!” And then he turns around and begins to make his way away to the sound of their renewed laughter and Ron saying “Be careful, you lightweight git!”

He's had more dignified exits, he's sure he has, regardless of what Ron thinks, the stupid dopey git, and then he can’t quite recall  _ why  _ he’d been insulting Ron in his head in the first place because he’s fumbling his way across the floor of the Leaky Cauldron, and now he’s thinking about why there are so many legs and feet _ everywhere  _ because he can’t seem to stop tripping  _ into  _ them,  _ ugh _ .

When he finally reaches the freedom of fresh cold air, he is so proud of himself that he plops down right there on the ground. And then proceeds to vomit into what he’s fairly sure are bushes. He squints at them. 

“Yess,” he decides.“Those’re... s’m bushes.” 

And then Harry’s lying down looking up at the stars, because now he’s noticing they really are all…  _ twinkly _ , and things. And he remembers Hermione saying something to him about a “cab,” and “inebriated states,” and other such things following his prompt announcement that he’s ready to go home now, Thanks, but he’s really very comfortable right here where he is, eyes hazily blinking up at the sky.

How long has he sat there? He doesn’t know, and he doesn’t care, but Harry’s lazily drifting train of thought skitters away when a shadow looms over him suddenly, and he slowly drags his eyes up to its source. His face scrunches up trying to decipher what the bloody hell it is, catching sight of an oddly familiar smugly handsome face, and dark skin, and dark eyes, and—

“Christ, Potter, I knew Gryffindors liked to use this place as some kind of slovenly watering hole, but it looks like the Saviour, himself, isn’t up to this challenge tonight.”

That voice is  _ also _ very familiar, Harry thinks, as well as that what he’s pretty sure is a mocking smile, but Harry is also having trouble stringing together sentences at the moment, and so what ends up coming out of his mouth is:

“‘Snot a desert in there,” and then, “Aren’ you that…” 

He frowns as he tries to think of the word he wants. Something about Slytherins, and panini, but he doesn’t think that’s quite right.

But Shadow Man is smiling even broader now, though maybe not in strictly the kindest way, and Harry is saved the trouble when he says, “Ahh, as astute as ever I see, Potter. I’m sure you don’t need reminding, naturally, the Great Saviour of the Wizarding World and all, but all the same, the name you might be looking for is Blaise Zabini. I happened to notice you choosing this little resting spot a few moments ago.”

And then Harry remembers tangled things from back at Hogwarts, and a certain clan of friends to a certain platinum blonde haired weasel, and not panini but  _ Zabini _ , and he's once again not quite sure how he got here, but he finds he doesn’t care. 

“‘M pretty sure there’s a—“ Harry’s face scrunches again—“ _ thing  _ I’m supposed to be doing right now, so you can save the fancy talk.” 

It’s hard to tell, but Harry thinks Zabini seems to get more amused the longer this goes on, and he says, “Right, of course nothing gets lost on you, Potter. I wouldn’t want to be so presumptuous as to assume what you were thinking of doing out here on a Saturday evening,” and he smirks even wider and Harry is just  _ so confused _ right now—“but perhaps you had planned to call a cab before this little detour?”

That rings a bell. . “Yeah, erm, I ‘spose that sounds about right.” 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is actually my first fic, and it’s not finished (not sure if I WILL finish it, but I hope to) and idk how to make it Chapters 1/? so imma just leave y’all with this for now, sorry!!

This is actually my first fic, and it’s not finished (not sure if I WILL finish it, but I hope to) and idk how to make it Chapters 1/? so imma just leave y’all with this for now, sorry!!


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